traveller2 Posted October 5, 2014 Share Posted October 5, 2014 ...literally.I gave a few bits of Goddess Isis statuary away last week and took down a little altar i had.For some years I have identified as a pagan.For me it was a good journey.I didn't want to have no spiritual component to my life and felt better in this identity.I have to say i had zero belief in any pagan god's existence but i guess it gave me some comfort that i was not a complete atheist which i was not yet ready to accept. Its been years now since I prayed unless you count the few times when low or fearful when I lay on my bed and reached out to pray but then quickly concluded there is not actually a god and did not actually pray.Sometimes I found myself talking conversationally to 'god' as I did things in my house as I had done so for about 15 years as a christian but then stopped when I noticed what I was doing and that I don't believe in god anymore.This is good because I really don't .Sometimes then and now I feel a little angry and a bit fearful that there is nothing even tho the practice as a believer never made me very happy anyway and in actual fact wrecked my life for those years. So here I am now relying on myself, something I was too afraid to do for so many years.Ive been edging closer and closer to this for sometime.Its a cunt that there is no god.No one to care and do something to alter life for my own benefit but there just simply is not.My own annoyance at having to be totally responsible and make my own way in life will not change this at all. However the good things of the past few years,the years of my deconversion have all been about just that,learning to live ,learning life skills that reliance on the invisible dictator stopped me from learning.Ive changed and learned so much and i am pleased with the result. This current fear of life and the future might reflect the deepest realization of a world without the god crutch.In other ways I am anticipating more and more personal growth ; this deeper knowledge that there is no higher power etc just me and then nothing at the end of it might produce more that pleases me in the coming years.More self reliance,more self responsibility, more learning and goals. I think at the root of it all is I am finally staring reality in the face but it is no different to what millions upon millions of happy and successful people have done for however many thousands of years there has been the human race.Everyone else can do it ,so why the fuck can I not? of course I can do it. Just wanted to share some thoughts and feelings about deconversion and the budding of the realization of zero god. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bdp Posted October 5, 2014 Share Posted October 5, 2014 Life without faith is an amazing journey, and for me at times has been a tough one but well worth it. Angus, I love your avatar! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leo Posted October 10, 2014 Share Posted October 10, 2014 Interesting response. I guess my experience with faith and prayer were a bit different. I almost hated to pray, because I knew the statistical odds of anything actually happening, and then I was going to have to go through the motions of justifying to myself why nothing happened. Not unlike the offspring of a derelict father. Now, I skip the middle man, and do it myself, as I actually always did, but no need to jerry-rig / apologize for dereliction of duty, duty assigned to a phantom of society's collective imagination. Even the prayer model I had ascribed to for the past 15 years was just more middle man effort: Prayer only changes how you look at the situation, there isn't any real change to the situation you can hope for. Even when we were with the Pentecostals, I and a few others held that belief. So, why not just change your manner with the situation, and skip the middle man? It's quicker. I know everyone has had different experiences with prayer though. And, during a couple of particularly difficult situation, I have been tempted to pray. I stopped and thought about why: So I can a. check it off the list of means, and b. so later if something doesn't come out right, there's no guilt associated with not having paid the prayer tax to the invisible overlord(s). Any comfort I got from it is the same sort of comfort you get from knowing you checked something off the list, you made sure you covered your bases. There are Christians, too, who say: "Hands that help are far better than lips that pray." Well, I was one of these. When I was introduced to that maxim, I was helping out at a public event. An older guy and I were working in the back, he brought that up when I said, "Why do the circle thing? Why not jump in and get to work? It's gettin' a bit backed up, so." ... he told me the saying "Hands that help are more useful than lips that pray," and followed up with, "Be careful with that, a lotta Christians aren't gonna like that." So, even some of them understand this idea, even if they must keep it a secret. This past winter, I started looking at Odin and Thor, gods of my heritage, but I don't believe they're there, they're just archetypes for people's experiences. I couldn't have gone pagan, as I wouldn't know what to do with / pray to one of these, what it would want, that sort of stuff that gets ground into you from childhood indoctrination into a particular religion. By looking at that stuff, I realized I am actually atheist, and probably had been for some time. I don't see anything delitirious with the idea of knocking off one last time and that's it. I'm just relieved my friend who died of AIDS in the 1980s is not being kept alive and conscious for the express purpose of tortures forever, in the presence of the bronze-aged deity we were supposed to love. The same is true of several others I know who died and weren't Christians. And the same would have been statistically likely to be true for most people I know Every person's experience with this is wildly different. I can see that from reading these forums for the past five months or so. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnastasiaTuggle Posted October 14, 2014 Share Posted October 14, 2014 I went a similar route when I started deconverting. Even though I know it does nothing I still haven't been able to force myself to get rid of all of my things. I think it is about time to let it all go. I understand what you mean about the "God crutch." It is scary to feel like you have nothing to turn to when something has always filled that role. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
traveller2 Posted October 15, 2014 Author Share Posted October 15, 2014 Hi thanks for your replies.i decided to wait a while and let this subject settle in me.Since writing I have become alot more comfortable with the concept of no god(s).It leaves a gap which is intriguing and then becomes quite exciting;an increase of freedom.,i am not elated but i do get a sense that the world is my oyster.Its actually good to live as if there is nothing in terms of a deity,its not so fearful.The responsibility for ones own life brings with it ambition and a desire to 'write my own story' if that is not too cliched. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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